Steph De Lander on Her TNA Departure, Underwent Second Neck Surgery & Was Cleared By WWE Doctor, Belief TNA Doesn’t Have Budget For Proper Medical Team, Her Situation Might Have Been Handled Differently If Gail Kim Was Still Talent Relations, & More

As noted before, Mance Warner and Steph De Lander recently departed from TNA Wrestling over issues related to TNA refusing to clear De Lander to return from her neck injury and telling her that she would never be able to wrestle for the promotion again.

A recent episode of TMZ’s Inside The Ring podcast featured De Lander as the guest. One of the topics discussed included De Lander’s thoughts about her recent departure from TNA and how she feels confident about her decision to leave the company.

“Look, it’s been a crazy couple of days. It’s not what I expected my next career pivot to look like, but, I feel confident in my decision and I do believe everything does happen for a reason so yeah, it’s been a whirlwind, but, I feel good, I feel confident.”

De Lander also revealed that she had underwent a second neck surgery that she did not share with the public and WWE’s spinal surgeon performed both operations and this surgeon had medically cleared her. De Lander also gave her thoughts about how TNA never felt comfortable clearing her and her husband left TNA in a show of solidarity for her.

“So, basically, I’ve had a neck injury for a while, and I’ve actually had two neck surgeries. No one knows that. I only posted about one, but I actually had two. My surgeon wanted to put a little bit more hardware in there. But fully recovered, fully healed. I actually went to WWE’s spinal surgeon to do the surgeries, and I got clearance a few weeks ago, so, I had been pitching storylines and working towards my in-ring return with TNA. But then, I received a phone call on Monday of this week that basically they never wanted to let me wrestle at TNA again. They just didn’t feel comfortable with that. So then I made the decision to leave, and my husband did too in solidarity.”

De Lander also gave her thoughts about her conversation with TNA President Carlos Silva and him stating that TNA was not interested in having her return to the ring for the company.

“So I reached out actually to my boss and was like, ‘Look, if there’s been a conversation about me not wrestling again, just let me know,’ and yeah, Carlos (Silva) called me on Monday and told me, ‘Look, we’re just not comfortable with you wrestling,’ and I was like, ‘Well, I’m literally fully cleared’ and he said, ‘Yep, not into it,’ and then I asked, ‘Do you know what my injury is?’ And he didn’t know. He couldn’t tell me what my injury was. It’s definitely based on personal feelings. I mean, I have not been evaluated by any medical professional on the TNA end. They have a chiropractor at the shows and I think one other doctor who I’ve barely spoken with so, they haven’t evaluated my medical history, they haven’t contacted my surgeon, they haven’t looked at any of my medical stuff. It’s just, they made a personal decision and yeah, that’s where we are now.”

De Lander also stated that she holds no ill will towards TNA and she believes they understand why she made the move to leave the company.

“I mean, I don’t think there is a bridge that has been burned. I don’t have any personal ill will towards anyone. I enjoyed working there. A lot of people that work there, I really respect. I’m hurt about the situation of course, but I also think that they probably understand and I think a lot of people when they hear this interview and actually hear more of the nuts and bolts of the situation will understand too. So, in a few years time, if they see that I’ve been wrestling and I’ve been fine and maybe they wanna offer me something, we’ll have that conversation, or if there are different people in charge that have different opinions, we can have that conversation again too. I don’t wanna never say never to anything, or to anyone. It’s all just how my journey goes but, I think I’m done with TNA for right now.”

De Lander also gave her thoughts about how she had paid for her surgeries and post-surgery recovery out of pocket and how she had conversations with TNA about what it would look like when she returned and the possibility of a pay raise for her to help out with the costs.

“So I’ve paid for both of my surgeries. I paid for P.T. for both of them. My insurance maxed out so I currently have a $9,000 AdventHealth bill sitting there, that I’m gonna get to at some point but, yeah, it was 100 percent covered on my end and if you’re not working at TNA — I was not on a salary, I was not getting paid every week regardless. If you’re not there, if you’re not on the road, if you’re not working, you don’t get paid so, yeah, financially, it was a very big hit as well.

The agreement was always, we will get to a point where as long as I’m fully cleared, I will get back in the ring again. We’d even had conversations about money. ‘Hey, we’re gonna pay you X amount, but once you’re back in the ring wrestling, we can renegotiate and we can give you a pay rise.’ So there was definitely the notion presented to me of we are gonna get to a point where you are back in the ring again…”

De Lander also gave her thoughts about her belief that TNA does not have the budget set aside to put a proper medical team in place to assist wrestlers with major injuries.

“I think it’s because they don’t have a budget set aside for injuries and a proper medical team. At WWE or AEW, there is a fully-staffed medical team. They have doctors, they have PTs, they have all sorts of people whose job it is to take care of the wrestlers when they get injured, to rehab them back to full health, and then to let them continue their careers as wrestlers. Unfortunately, TNA does not have it set up like that whatsoever. As I said, majority of my communication about my injury was through their chiropractor, who I spent 18 months trying to get a return to the ring protocol out of it, and I only got it a month ago. So, they really don’t have a setup for injuries, especially for spinal injuries, and that’s honestly why I wanted to be open about my story is, A, I want people to know the truth of the injury and the situation because I’ve already seen a bunch of misinformation online. So I wanted to set that straight of I had a one-level cervical spinal (injury) of my C5, C6 joint, or vertebrae, which is the most basic, straightforward neck injury that so many wrestlers in WWE and AEW have had before, fully recovered and returned to the ring. I did not break my neck. That’s not what happened. Even though my boss told me I broke my neck, I did not. Just to clear that up, I had a fusion because I had a bulging disc.”

De Lander also gave her thoughts about her belief that Chris Bey’s broken neck injury in October of 2024 had shocked TNA but it did not lead to them taking injuries more seriously for their wrestlers. De Lander also gave her thoughts about how she had asked TNA for products from their partner BioFlex to assist with her recovery only to be told they gave the products to other wrestlers.

“I think they are worried or they were worried about my situation if I did get back in the ring. I don’t think they could handle a Chris Bey situation happening again with someone else, financially, or PR-wise or whatever else and I think a big part of them being really hesitant to let me get back in the ring probably has something to do with that situation. But, in spite of that situation, they still didn’t take my injury anymore seriously or try to get me extra support or even down to, like, we had a relationship with BioFlex which does the red light therapy treatments and I had asked, ‘Hey, I know we get free BioFlex products. Do you think I could get some for my neck recovery?’ And I was told, ‘Oh, we’ve already given them to other talent.’ People that aren’t injured. So, I was really trying to just get bottom-of-the-barrel support in any way… From a business standpoint, I think the Chris Bey situation definitely shook them. I don’t think it made them take injuries anymore seriously though.”

De Lander also gave her thoughts about if her situation with TNA would have been handled differently if Gail Kim was still in Talent Relations in TNA and if it would have also been different if she was a man.

“I have thought to myself, if I was one of their top guys, they would probably be slapping me on the ass and saying, ‘Go get ‘em bud. Get back on the field.’ That’s how I feel and maybe that’s just me being emotional about it or too close to the situation or whatever else… I can’t help but feel, okay, if we still had Gail Kim in Talent Relations and had a woman in there fighting for the women, maybe these conversations could have gone differently. But we don’t have that anymore. So I’m not trying to make it a gender thing but it kind of becomes that by nature. I do feel like it is a little bit of favoritism and I also do wonder to myself, if I was a guy, would this be handled the same way? Because it’s easy to say, ‘Oh, just be a manager. Who cares?’ And they told me that. They said, ‘If you wanna stay and just manage, you can do that.’ But they’re not gonna say that to a guy. So, I do think every situation is different… Whether that’s just emotional feelings or whatever else, I do have to wonder if I was a guy, would it be different?”

De Lander also gave her thoughts about how TNA was interested in keeping Warner in the company despite her wanting out but she feels he wouldn’t have been given a new contract after his current one expires in three months.

“Mance (Warner) and I had spoken about it beforehand, and I basically said, ‘If they tell me I can’t wrestle, I’m quitting on the spot,’ and he was like, ‘Oh, I am too…’ They called me, I had the phone call. I asked (for) my release on the phone call. I said, ‘Send it to me today,’ and then they called Mance and were kind of like, ‘Hey, you can stay,’ and he was like, ‘I’m not…’ Mance was told he could stay but also the other thing too is our contracts were up in three months and I didn’t think we were gonna be renewed anyways at that point, so, it felt like there was nothing else for us here. We need to leave and we need to leave now.”

Transcript h/t: Fightful.com 1, 2, 3, 4, & 5